Richard Branson: The Key to Success Is Intention

The key to success, according to Richard Branson, is not only productivity and motivation – but intention.

“A day without intention is a day wasted,” the Virgin Group CEO writes in a recent blog post. “Without intention, there can be no productivity, and in turn no success.”

Whether you’re simply going on a morning jog or starting a business, Branson writes that intention is the driving force. And take it from this billionaire entrepreneur – he definitely knows a thing or two about success.

For all you budding entrepreneurs, it’s important to spend your 24 hours wisely.

Branson has some tips on how you can get started:

1. Start every day fresh

If you “get caught up in the challenges of yesterday or focus too much on the past, it can be hard to move on and achieve future goals,” he writes. For Branson, that means getting outdoors and being active – but you should do your own thing. Meditation, reading, a quick crossword puzzle – there are plenty of ways to get your mind ready for the day.

2. Write your intentions down

3. Use your time wisely

As busy entrepreneurs, time is valuable. Branson uses all of his extra minutes while traveling – he even interviewed Virgin Group CEO Josh Bayliss in the back of a car during a traffic jam. So if you’re on an airplane, waiting for an appointment or stuck in traffic – use your time wisely.

Your Worth Is Not Measured By Your Productivity

We live in a world that glorifies the term ‘being busy’ and down plays terms such as ‘burn out’ and ‘mental health’. After all, that’s how we measure success right. It’s ok to be burnt out, because it means you’re successful and pushing yourself. It’s unthinkable that a woman can achieve her goals if she only works an 08h00 – 17h00 right. Wrong. I recently left my corporate job, with my comfortable salary, to pursue the unknown. I’m still ‘busy’, the only difference is that I’m more flexible now.

What that means is that I can take time away from work to cook dinner, attend a family birthday etc and work my schedule around that. When I worked in corporate that flexibility was not offered. It’s about making time for the things that matter, while still ticking off my to-do list and making sure my clients feel happy, secure and taken care of. Clients don’t ask too many questions if they’re getting regular updates and feel as though things are moving along.

1. Forgive yourself

It took me some time to learn to forgive myself. For putting my career above my friends, my family and myself. In my first week as a freelancer, I had been working late nights and on the Friday afternoon I crashed at 2pm, had an hour-long nap and then carried on. I kind of beat myself up for that. Accusing myself of being lazy, telling myself I didn’t have the luxury to have a nap during the day and I was disappointed with myself. I had to learn that it’s OK to give yourself what you need, when you need it, to thrive.

Whether it’s a late afternoon power nap or saying no to new business when you’ve reached capacity. It’s OK to do you, forgive yourself for being human.

2. Motivation

It’s easy to stay motivated when things are going well. It’s a different story when things aren’t going well. Remember why you started your journey, remember your training and reach out to your network. Never be ashamed of your hustle. 90% of my current business came from me reaching out to my current network. It’s amazing how once you start doing things you love; how many people want to help you succeed and support you. They need to know what you’re doing first, to offer you their business.

I also remember, when I first started telling people I had left corporate to start my own venture I always received 1 of 3 responses:

Wow you’re so brave, that’s so inspiring. I wish I could do what you’re doing

Wow are you sure that’s the smartest thing to do right now, you know the economy and blah blah blah

Oh wow, it must be so nice being a lady of leisure, do you go for coffee dates with friends and watch series during the day.

The doubters used to scare me because, to be honest, I had a little bit of doubt myself. ‘Can I really do this, will I succeed?, what if I fail?’, those are questions I kept asking myself. Now I use the comments as motivation, whatever the comment is, you’re inspired by me, great, keep watching…. You don’t recommend I start my own business in this economy…. Cool, please watch this space. You think I drink margaritas and tan all day, ok, watch my success, while I’m sipping on this pink drink. You need to be so mentally strong to be an entrepreneur and it’s your responsibility to stay motivated.

3. Discipline

Routine is important when you’re a business owner. There will be days where you work a late night and need a little extra sleep in the am, I encourage you to get back into your routine as soon as possible though. On the days where you don’t feel like doing your work – those are usually admin days. Hack the system, go for a run, have a coffee, do what you need to do to re-set your mind and then get back into it. No-one is going to stop you from self-destructing, so keep the discipline and grind! No one is going to force you to do it, so you must force yourself.

4. Enjoyment

While being your own boss is tough and comes with a different set of concerns, remember why you started. Enjoy the peace of mind and happiness, realising you are in full control of your destiny. Celebrate those small wins. It’s difficult to be motivated and disciplined, to find work and keep it. Celebrate your successes, a million people are killing 8 hours a day working jobs they hate, wishing they had the courage to pursue their dreams. You’re already doing that, you’ve taken the plunge and you have a responsibility to succeed. Enjoy the process throughout the way. There’s nothing as rewarding as gaining a new client, getting great client feedback or completing a job well done.

When I worked in corporate I would kill myself to pull off a campaign, giving up sleep, family time etc. Knowing I did a kick-ass job, never once receiving praise from a client. When I heard my manager ask why she never thanked us, her response was ‘But we pay you to do this, it’s expected, please don’t ask me to thank you for doing your job, when I’m paying you to do that job’. That’s when I realised I would have to find fulfilment and enjoyment from within.

5. Repeat

You will mess up, it’s inevitable, you’re human. No matter how good you are, how committed you are or motivated you are, it will happen. Get up and keep going, pick up your crown and keep marching on. There’s no use crying over spilled milk. Whether you’re in corporate or you’re your own boss, remember these 5 tips, modify and apply them to suit your situation and remember that your worth is not measured by your productivity. You can be successful while taking care of yourself both physically and mentally. It’s time to shine!

How You Can Turn Those ‘Near Wins’ Into Successes

As a start-up, there’s nothing more devastating than losing a deal you thought was yours, or realising your great idea isn’t the game-changer you thought it was. But there’s an upside to those ‘near misses’ — they’re excellent opportunities to learn from and perfect your offering.

By good fortune, I started my career in a commonly misunderstood and widely overlooked sub-sector within the aviation industry, load control. Don’t be embarrassed if you don’t know what that is. In simple terms, load control focuses on the safety of passengers and the weight and balance of an aircraft. The work ensures that the centre of gravity is always within certified limits and structural weight and balance restrictions are never exceeded. A huge responsibility, even for the trained and desensitised.

For most of us hyper-ambitious individuals, when we don’t get to ‘the top’ as per the initial plan, we tend to wonder whether it was even worth it to start our journey. We lose our centre of gravity. Being one of the two selected candidates (after a nationwide search with over 500 applicants) for a world-class management trainee programme and later moving on from that ‘fairly clear path to success’, I’d always felt like I had failed, and dismally.

Let me explain. The programme was aimed exclusively at nurturing new talent within Global Load Control. It was industry-specific, and when I secured such a coveted spot, I felt on top of the world — my path was clear. Except it wasn’t. I realised I wanted a different environment where I could get exposure to working with entrepreneurs, especially because by then I had spent time within the Cape Town start-up ecosystem. I knew exactly why I was moving on, but it still felt like I’d failed.

Here’s the harsh truth: Nearly winning is failure, but that’s okay. We learn from failure. I’ve established my own core values and I’ve dared to speak up and write my own narrative. I’ve learnt to own my purpose. The road hasn’t always been easy, but in hindsight, it’s definitely been worth it.

Creating a compelling need

I have an innate ability to choose industries that aren’t open to changing their status quo. I then intentionally challenge and critique how the systems in those industries have been operating. This means things rarely go my way. It’s the entrepreneurial mindset, whether you’re starting a business or employed, to question everything, and that’s my mantra — I always ask ‘why?’

The problem is that even though I know I have a solution my customers need, because I’m challenging the status quo, they don’t always see things my way.

As an entrepreneur, I’ve learnt that understanding the reason behind the multiple ‘not yet’ and ‘nos’ from your ideal first customers is a gift. But in order for you to claim that gift, you have to be committed to the process of understanding your customer’s needs.

Multiple authors and experts will tell you that however good your product or service is, the simple truth is that no one will buy it if they don’t want it or don’t believe they need it. And you won’t be able to persuade anyone that they want or need to buy what you’re offering unless you clearly understand what it is your customers want.

One aspect that isn’t being sufficiently discussed, is the fact that committing to that process is going to be uncomfortable and even painful in some cases. Really digging into your customer’s business to the point that you can offer them a real solution that they need takes confidence, resilience, hard work and sometimes even a thick skin if your customer or prospect pushes back. You need to really believe in your solution — but you also need to be willing to change what isn’t working.

Entrepreneurs are people too, and let’s face it, no parent wants to hear that their baby (or business or business idea) is ugly. Nurturing a positive view of yourself, finding ways of developing confidence in your ability to solve problems and trusting your instincts helps build resilience as an entrepreneur. And yes, that means that sometimes you have to face the truth and change what isn’t working in your business. When facing very painful events, try to consider the stressful situation in a broader context and keep a long-term perspective. Avoid blowing the event out of proportion because that terrible feeling of not winning at first will wear off, eventually.

Stimulation for further achievement and mastery

When we don’t complete projects perfectly, it can feel as though we’ve failed. However, ‘near wins’ are important steps in achieving our long-term goals. Near wins are almost, if not always, more important than actual wins, as they set in motion a constant pursuit of improvement. In her brilliant TED Talk Embrace the Near Win, Sarah Lewis deep dives into the concept of the near win and how it’s instrumental in achieving success.

I, like most people, have experienced my own set of near wins. According to Sarah, that’s okay, because failure is what we experience on the way to mastery. And mastery is ultimately more important than success. Sarah defines success as a single moment. Something that comes and goes and is a byproduct of effort. However, what she calls mastery, is the act of working towards something. A system for continuing to set and reach for goals. As I’ve personally learnt, being engaged in that system is a crucial element in mastering your goal. Purposeful efforts make life interesting.

Stay on your own leading edge

More will always be required of you. That’s a fact. Recovering from failure requires sufficient strength and an ability to support your sense of well-being while managing the stresses brought about by failure.

The trick is learning the art of bouncing back. The term most often used is resilience. The Road to Resilience, a publication of the American Psychological Association and the Discovery Health Channel, offers a useful definition. “Resilience is the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or even significant sources of stress — like family and relationship problems, serious health problems, or workplace and financial stressors. Find ways that are likely to work well for YOU as part of YOUR own personal strategy for fostering resilience and overcoming failure. Along pathways to success and mastery, entrepreneurs, change agents and leaders alike will find adversity, doubt, and near wins. How you manage those is what matters, so learn and adjust where necessary.”

One last thing I would like to stress is learning to cope with who you are as a person. Take care of yourself. Pay attention to your own needs and feelings. I know it’s a cliché but it’s also essential to your overall well-being and success. Engage in activities that you enjoy and find relaxing. Exercise regularly. Taking care of yourself helps to keep your mind and body primed to deal with situations that require resilience. Protect your peace because you can’t possibly function in chaos. Remember this, the dark moments that will come will also pass, so focus on getting that shine on. Cheers to celebrating your next near win.

As an entrepreneur, I’ve learnt that understanding the reason behind the multiple ‘not yet’ and ‘nos’ from your ideal first customers is a gift. But in order for you to claim that gift, you have to be committed to the process of understanding your customer’s needs.

Staying motivated

It’s called ‘the entrepreneurial journey’ for a reason. It might take you a bit of time to see the value of some lessons and that’s okay, the light bulb will go on eventually.

Accept that you don’t know everything. While you may start to build a business and it actually begins to work, don’t think that you’ve become a Mrs/Mr know-it-all. Continue to learn from your customers and the people around you

It’s not all about you and your idea. Your business will exist because there’s a value exchange between yourself and your customer. Be very clear about what that value is and how you can keep improving on it

Find a mentor. By that I mean someone who’s actually built a business and succeeded, not an entrepreneurship activist. Inspiring entrepreneurship activists are fine, but it helps to have a solid sounding board and that takes experience, and someone who has experienced failure themselves.

Breathe. Starting a business is hard, growing one is hard and running one is hard. Doing this day in and day out can be exhausting. Remember to celebrate the small wins and avoid the notion that you have to land some fantastic, outstanding client or reach thousands of customers before celebrating. Rejoice over the first customer or transaction, or over squashing a minor coding bug in a few days.

WATCH THIS

Embrace the Near Win by Sarah Lewis

“My triumphs are not merely the result of a grand achievement, but of the propulsion of a lineage of near wins.”— Arctic explorer Ben Saunders

Sarah Lewis is an art historian and critic who celebrates creativity and shows how it can lead us through fear and failure to ultimate success

In her talk Embrace the Near Win, Sarah Lewis shares the following insights:

Success is a moment, but what we’re always celebrating is creativity and mastery. The secret is converting successes – big, small and near misses – into mastery. This starts with the value you give to a near win.

Success is achieving a specific goal, but mastery is knowing that it means nothing if you can’t do it again and again.

Mastery is not the same as excellence. It’s also not the same as success, which is an event, a moment in time, and a label that the world confers upon you. Mastery is not a commitment to a goal but to a constant pursuit.

In other words, the pursuit of mastery is an ever-onward almost.

Mastery is in the reaching, not the arriving. It’s in constantly wanting to close that gap between where you are and where you want to be.

Success motivates us, but a near win can propel us in an ongoing quest.

6 Reasons Why Concrete Goals Are Essential To Entrepreneurial Success

Believe it – there is a right way and a wrong way to approach setting career goals. In a nutshell, the more specific your goals are, the better.

If your professional goals are nebulous, like “become rich” or “gain success,” you may be psyching yourself out without even realising what you’re doing. Setting specific goals gives you the motivation and focus to begin making them a reality.

Here are just six reasons why you need to set specific goals to get ahead in your professional career to get ahead:

1. They keep you motivated

Setting specific goals allows you to get really clear on what you are working toward in your career and why.

For instance, if you have a vague goal like “Make more money,” it will supply similarly vague motivation. When you reach the first sign of resistance, that goal will seem unattainable and too hard, and you’ll be more likely to give up.

On the other hand, a specific goal like “Buy a condo in San Diego” is very specific and gives you something specific to work toward and to help you maintain motivation.

2. You’re more likely to achieve specific goals

Goal Setting Theory is the culmination of research that began in the 1960s by Dr. Edwin Locke and Dr. Gary Latham. In researching the connection between clear goals and performance, they found that there was a relationship between how difficult and how specific a goal was and people’s performance of a task. Further, they discovered that specific and difficult goals led to better task performance than vague or easy goals.

Basically, research shows that when you have specific long-term goals, you’re far more likely to perform better, which will ultimately make achieving said goals far more possible.

3. You can break big goals into mini goals

A benefit of setting specific goals is that you can then get tactical about how to make them a reality. Namely, you can break each goal down into mini goals or milestones.

Say that one of your goals is to increase sales for your business by 25 percent this year. You can set specific dollar amounts as milestones for each month or quarter.

Having mini goals like this will help you stay inspired and will give you an impetus to put specific actions in work to make them happen.

4. You can adjust as needed

Specific goals are kind of like a career roadmap.

However, just like your car’s GPS, sometimes you need to shift the destination for various reasons. It’s easier to shift or adjust a specific goal than it is to change a vague one.

For instance, say you are approaching your very specific goal at a more rapid rate than anticipated. To keep yourself motivated, you can look at that goal and adjust it to meet your current circumstances. This way, you always have something to work toward and can continue to push yourself in positive ways.

5. They will make you more confident

There’s nothing like the sense of accomplishment that comes from setting a specific goal, working hard and then finally attaining it. It makes you feel confident and secure in your own abilities.

When you’re imbued with this sense of self-accomplishment, it has the effect of making you feel more self-confident. Self-confidence can help you advance quicker in your career and improve your performance, which helps keep you working toward your goals with ease.

6. They make you more ambitious

Once you’ve set and then attained a few specific goals, you’ll believe in yourself even more. This means that as you progress in your career, your goals will become even bigger and more ambitious.

By continually setting specific goals and adjusting them to remain aspirational, you’ll create a powerful source of inspiration that will serve you throughout the course of your career and life.

Set specific goals from now on and you’ll see a big difference over time!